A T-Third train enters the Twin Peaks Tunnel at Forest Hill Station in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, June 22, 2018. In January 2019, state workplace safety regulators recommended $65,300 in fines for two companies hired to do subcontracting work last year on the 100-year-old tunnel.

Photo: Jessica Christian / The Chronicle

California workplace safety regulators fined two companies subcontracted to do construction on San Francisco’s Twin Peaks Tunnel after a worker was killed on the job last summer.

The California Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or Cal/OSHA, last month issued four fines to joint ventures Shimmick Construction and Con-Quest Contractors totaling $65,300 related to the August death of employee Patrick Ricketts.

State investigators found the companies did not “effectively identify and evaluate workplace hazards” before Ricketts’ death, officials wrote in a Feb. 8 report.

The death sparked controversy after it was revealed that Shimmick Construction had a history of safety violations before being co-awarded the $40 million contract by the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.

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SFMTA officials said the agency trusted bidders to truthfully respond to a pre-qualification questionnaire. Oakland-based Shimmick Construction checked a box saying it had no safety violations during the past decade despite having 39 safety violations from Cal/OSHA over that time, officials said.

The SFMTA said it has since started checking on bidders’ safety backgrounds.

Ricketts, a 51-year-old signal technician, was killed in the 100-year-old tunnel during a two-month shutdown, when workers were hired to replace more than two miles of track and upgrade infrastructure.

Around 4:40 p.m. on Aug. 10, Ricketts was walking out of the West Portal side of the tunnel to retrieve tools as a slow-moving crane pushed two loaded railcars into the tunnel, according to Cal/OSHA.

The crane’s boom struck a 1.2-ton beam, knocking it off its brackets and sending it tumbling 13 feet down, where it struck Ricketts on the head and killed him.

Managers with Shimmick Construction and Con-Quest Contractors did not immediately return requests for comment.

Evan Sernoffsky is a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle specializing in criminal justice, crime and breaking news. He’s covered some of the biggest Bay Area news stories in recent memory, including wildfires, mass shootings and criminal justice reform efforts in San Francisco. He has given a voice to victims in some of the region’s biggest tragedies, carefully putting himself in challenging situations to make sure their stories are told. He works out of San Francisco’s Hall of Justice where he keeps watch on the city’s courts and hits the streets to expose the darker side of a city undergoing rapid change. He moved to the Bay Area from Oregon where he grew up and worked as a journalist for several years.